I bought the Finepix S602 in mid-2002 for 550.00, and 450.00 for the S9100 a month ago. Just amazing to see the relationship between price and technology over time.
Basically I like the S9100 a lot. It performs great under low light. It focuses when the S602 fails miserably. Noise is rather low at ISO 400 and still acceptable for printing 8x10 at ISO 800. When it sits on a sturdy tripod, all pictures come out sharp even after extended exposures. Result from handhelds is a different story. Any exposure at focal lengths longer than 150 with speed of 1/30 of a second or lower is not promising. Unless shooting in bright daylight, it is almost impossible to get a clean shot at the longest focal length. Anti-shake or high-speed does not perform well especially high ISO is already in use -- you get either a blurry or dark picture. The grip is less comfortable, compared to the S602's sharper edge (I don't have long fingers.) The zoom ring is a charm -- fast and accurate. The flip-out LCD is particularly great for high and low shots. The AE lock set to hold works well; this give you an extra finger to keep the camera steady. Burst mode is less than half of what S602 gives
< The mode dial appears momentarily on the viewfinder really helps, whereas the green focusing beam is annoying and could take a while to focus.
Problems:
There seems to be a flaw with the picture counter. Even it was set to continuous, it always resets itself when a newly formatted media is inserted in the camera (I only use CF; don't know about XD.)
Basically I like the S9100 a lot. It performs great under low light. It focuses when the S602 fails miserably. Noise is rather low at ISO 400 and still acceptable for printing 8x10 at ISO 800. When it sits on a sturdy tripod, all pictures come out sharp even after extended exposures. Result from handhelds is a different story. Any exposure at focal lengths longer than 150 with speed of 1/30 of a second or lower is not promising. Unless shooting in bright daylight, it is almost impossible to get a clean shot at the longest focal length. Anti-shake or high-speed does not perform well especially high ISO is already in use -- you get either a blurry or dark picture. The grip is less comfortable, compared to the S602's sharper edge (I don't have long fingers.) The zoom ring is a charm -- fast and accurate. The flip-out LCD is particularly great for high and low shots. The AE lock set to hold works well; this give you an extra finger to keep the camera steady. Burst mode is less than half of what S602 gives
< The mode dial appears momentarily on the viewfinder really helps, whereas the green focusing beam is annoying and could take a while to focus.Problems:
There seems to be a flaw with the picture counter. Even it was set to continuous, it always resets itself when a newly formatted media is inserted in the camera (I only use CF; don't know about XD.)